Complications
by Maiyrhia
Summary: Sonic the Hedgehog's life was already crazy enough, without romance throwing another spanner in the works. The fact that the spanner in question is none other than Shadow can only make things even harder...
1. Chapter 1

**Fair Warning**

This fanfic is a Sonadow. Meaning Sonic/Shadow relationship. If you're really not into that, then consider this your one and only "Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here" warning, however there will _not_ be any explicit content; such activities will take place behind a fade-to-black.

 **A note on characters' ages**

Partway through writing this, I came to stumble upon certain characters' canonical ages. Before anyone else reaches for the brain bleach, let me establish that this was written with the following in mind:

Sonic - the birthday party in Generations was his 18th, thus making him a young adult.

Shadow - his age is basically meaningless as he was created in a lab, but physically the equivalent of somewhere in his early 20s.

Amy - a couple of years younger than Sonic, at 16

Knuckles - a year older than Sonic, at 19

Rouge - still her canonical 18

Silver - still his canonical 14

Tails - still his canonical 8

Other characters should be considered to be their canonical ages, unless stated otherwise.

 **Chapter 1**

The Chaos Spear narrowly missed Sonic's head, close enough to scorch the tips of his ears. He ducked, rolled and came straight back to his feet as he kept running. "Hah!" he shouted triumphantly. "You're going down, Shadow!"

"You wish," Shadow shot back, although there was no real bite in his voice. A blast from his hover skates let him sail over Sonic's attempt at tripping him. "This time, it's you who'll fall."

The countryside sped by in a blur as the two supersonic hedgehogs raced, the miles passing by in moments. Sonic was grinning, clear joy on his face as he ran. "You're getting delusional, Shadow!"

"Hmph." Shadow's expression was as cold as ever.

Sonic ducked sideways to avoid a punch, laughing with sheer _joy_ at the fun of the race. Privately, he suspected Shadow enjoyed it as much as he did; why else would his dark counterpart agree to race every time he asked? He curled into a spiky ball, bouncing off a rock and into the air. He uncurled as he reached the peak of the jump. "Take this!" He kicked out as he fell, his foot heading straight for Shadow's head...

"Chaos Control!"

He landed awkwardly as his foot connected with nothing but empty air, losing speed as he stumbled. "Where'd you go?" he shouted, but the answer came all too soon as a blazing kick hit the back of his own head. He fell, hitting the city street hard and sprawling into a gutter.

Shadow smirked slightly, skating straight over Sonic's prone form and coming to a halt in a square not far ahead. "So much for the 'fastest thing alive'."

Sonic picked himself up with a groan, running to catch up with Shadow. "You cheated!"

"You mean I won," Shadow corrected with a shrug.

"Yeah, right." Sonic could not quite help but smile despite technically losing the race. "Next time, try and beat me without a Chaos Emerald, we'll see who's really faster."

Shadow folded his arms with a small glare. "If you want me to humiliate you like that, then fine. Just name your time, and I'll beat you without Chaos powers."

"Same time tomorrow?" Sonic asked. "Unless Eggman attacks, then take a rain check until Wednesday?"

"You're on."

" _Sonic!"_ A rapidly-approaching female voice was screaming his name.

Sonic's eyes widened. "Uh, gotta go Shadow," he babbled, keen to get far away before Amy Rose could arrive. "See ya!" He took off running again, leaving Shadow to deal with her.

* * *

"... and you know, Shadow's actually predictable about when he tries to trip me up. He always tenses up slightly, then glances over, and that's when I know to jump over it..."

"Sonic!" Tails interrupted. The little fox stifled a yawn, fiddling with one of his twin namesakes. "How many hours can you spend talking about one race?"

Sonic looked up at the stars, suddenly aware of just how long he had been sitting on the rooftop with his best friend, recounting the events of the race earlier. "Uh..." He grinned, easily turning the situation into a joke. "Oh, I'm good for another two or three more."

Tails yawned in reply. "Well, I'm not," he said, utterly failing to stifle it this time. "Goodnight, Sonic."

"Goodnight, Tails." Sonic looked up at the sky again, but there was a large patch of cloud over the moon. Sonic sighed in disappointment; the moon was supposed to be full tonight, and after the whole werehog incident he had somewhat enjoyed seeing that without turning into a gruesome monster. He looked at the stars again, and cringed slightly at the bad influence he apparently was when it came to setting bedtimes. There was maybe time for a plate of chili dogs before bed; after all, he would need to recover his strength for the rematch with Shadow tomorrow.

One plate turned into three plates, and it was a very happy - and very full - Sonic that was heading to bed later on. He had just settled down to sleep when he was disturbed by a loud pounding that sounded as if an _army_ was trying to break down his front door. For a moment, he tried to ignore it, even sticking his head under his pillow, but all that achieved was a torn pillow and feathers in his quills. He groaned as the pounding only grew louder, stood up, shook off the feathers, made a mental note to ask Tails to invent a quill-proof pillow case, and went to get rid of whoever was at the door.

From the volume of the pounding, Sonic had expected to find either Knuckles, or an actual army, presumably of Eggman's robots. When he opened the door, however, he found himself face-to-face with a dishevelled purple swallow. He looked her up and down; her clothes were streaked with dirt, her trademark bandana askew and her feathers crooked and out of place. "Uh..." He blinked, half wondering if he was still asleep, and in that case whether he should lay off the chili dogs before bed. "Okay, Wave... couple of questions..."

She pushed past him without waiting for him to invite her in. "I'm not here because I want to be, you know."

He pinched himself hard, and only when he proved he was in fact awake did he reply. "Yeah, I kinda guessed that from the way you guys only ever show up when Jet wants to prove himself faster than me." He looked back outside. "Speaking of..."

"Shut the door, that's why I'm here," she replied with a sigh.

"Sonic?" Tails asked sleepily from somewhere behind him. "What's going on?"

Sonic's foot started to tap as he shut the door. "Serious question, Wave. Is this something I can deal with in ten minutes flat, or do I need to go make coffee?"

Wave shook her head. "It's definitely not a ten-minute problem."

He nodded. "I'll be back," he said, running to the kitchen. It was, perhaps, a testament to the number of all-nighters the pair had been forced to pull in fighting Eggman that Tails had invented the ultimate coffee maker, a machine capable of making a giant pot of caffeine in only moments. When he returned, bearing the pot and three mugs, he saw Tails handing Wave a cleaning rag, and the swallow wiping some dirt that had apparently jammed in one of her Extreme Gear's jets.

Wave sighed in frustration as the rag only succeeded in making everything worse. The hoverboard, about the size and shape of a wheel-less skateboard, was now about as useful as one. "I'm going to have to get this properly cleaned out, or it'll never run long enough to get back to the others," she muttered aloud.

Tails opened a door, looking somewhat fluffier in his pride. "Why don't you use my workshop, Wave? We can talk about whatever your problem is while you fix your Extreme Gear!" When she only nodded distractedly and walked into the workshop he whispered, "Sonic, I think she's really freaking out. She hasn't bullied me once yet..."

"Okay, that's weird," he whispered back. "For Wave, that's like..."

"Like you not feeling like running," Tails finished.

"Pretty much." Sonic headed into the messy workshop, pouring the coffee while Tails booted up the computer and Wave started to disassemble the Extreme Gear's dirt-jammed jet. "Now, what's so important?"

Wave took a long drink of coffee before replying. "Jet, Storm and me were investigating some old ruins, when some kind of energy shield sprang up out of nowhere. Jet and Storm were caught inside, and I couldn't get through it."

"Energy shield?" Tails echoed, already pulling up various technical diagrams on his computer.

"Not that kind," Wave corrected. "What you're looking at is a personal shield, I'm talking _huge_. As in, I can't be sure, but it looked like Angel Island got caught inside too..."

Sonic's foot was already starting to tap impatiently. "Angel Island? There's no way that's a coincidence. Was there a way in?"

Wave shook her head, and finished her mug of coffee. "No. At least, not from where I was. Maybe I could have got past it from the inside, but there's _no_ chance Jet and Storm are going to figure it out."

"Same for Knucklehead," Sonic muttered, refilling all their mugs. It took less than two seconds to run to the kitchen, refill the pot with Tails's coffee maker, and return to the workshop with it. "You said not from where you were?"

"Exactly." She pushed a bunch of technical junk aside to take the faulty jet apart without losing any of the small parts. "It looked like there was a giant robot army camped out to one side, and the shield was too big for me to check all the way around."

"Too big?" Sonic grinned, finishing two more mugs of coffee in quick succession. Now positively _vibrating_ from a mixture of caffeine and excitement, he grinned at the others. "Okay, you guys stay here and try to figure out things from the brainpower side of things. I'll go take a run around that shield. Wave, where am I going?"

Wave pointed at a spot on a map, and started to speak - and shut her beak again as the only thing left of Sonic was the breeze left from him exiting at well over a hundred miles an hour.

* * *

The energy shield was over three hundred miles away. The speed of sound was three hundred and forty-three miles per hour. For Sonic the Hedgehog, this meant the speed of sound lay bleeding and broken some distance behind him as he easily made it to his destination in just over half an hour.

He slowed his pace considerably, staying carefully out of sight of the giant mech army Wave had warned him about. Without having to focus quite so hard on the fast-moving ground beneath his feet, this gave Sonic time to think as he began to circle the giant shield. It was, at best, translucent, glowing and sparkling blue. It was too hard to make out much through it, but there was indeed a big _something_ floating inside that could only be Angel Island.

Sonic made his first circuit of the shield, detouring to avoid the robot army. Not even he wanted to take on that many alone, so he gave them a wide berth and kept running closer to the edge of the shield at an even more sedate pace.

At this speed, barely fifty miles per hour, Sonic's mind started to wander from sheer boredom. He came to realise that every day for the past two weeks, save for one day when Eggman attacked, he had met Shadow for a race. Sure, he had always kind of enjoyed racing someone who could actually keep up with him, but recently he had found himself wanting to spend more and more time with Shadow...

Sonic shook his head in an attempt at clearing it. He was wasting his time, he knew. Shadow barely tolerated him, never mind friendship - much less anything more than that. So why could he not get the other hedgehog out of his mind? Shadow was his biggest rival, no matter what a certain hawk might think. So why, then, could Sonic not stop thinking about him?

He stopped, and began to run the other way around the shield in case he could see anything new from this angle, although he found himself completely unable to think of anything besides Shadow. Had he just now been thinking about being more than friends? With Shadow? Maybe all the fighting with Eggman had finally driven him insane. Maybe he had taken one too many knocks on the head while spin-dashing. The first problem was, the more he thought about it, the more certain he was about how he felt. The second problem was that it was _Shadow_ he had fallen for. Shadow the Hedgehog, the prince of grumpiness himself, the most withdrawn person Sonic knew.

He came to a halt, letting his head fall into his hands in something close to despair. He could not think of a more impossible relationship, of someone less likely to feel the same way about him. Of course, the moment he had _that_ thought, Eggman immediately popped unbidden into his mind as a less likely relationship, and Sonic shuddered at the idea his traitorous brain had come up with.

"Ugh," he muttered aloud, managing to turn his thoughts back to Shadow. He would simply have to find a way to move on; there would be no point in spending forever wishing for something that was impossible. Talking to Shadow about it could only be a terrible idea; the other hedgehog barely put up with him as it was, and Sonic had no desire to throw that away. So, he would just go to the race tomorrow - and try to act normal.

Sonic started to run back, realising that he was wasting his time on what was indeed an impenetrable shield. Time to see if the others had figured anything out, then go smash up the army and stop Eggman's latest plans. Then, there should be just enough time for a quick nap before racing Shadow again...

His black-and-red double popped right back into his mind, and Sonic pushed himself yet faster in an effort to _stop_ thinking about him. Spending time with Shadow, actual leisure time instead of their occasional meetings in combat... Sonic could not help but smile. What if he could do more, spend more time together besides their races?

He was so lost in his daydreams that he was back at Tails's place before he realised. He ran back into the workshop, grabbing the now-empty coffee pot and heading to the kitchen to refill it.

The coffee maker took a little over a second and a half to fill the pot. For Sonic, that was long enough to run to the window and stare out at the stars again. _Shadow's even darker than the night sky_ , he found himself thinking, looking up at the moon, now visible with the large cloud dispersed. After half a second, he frowned. During his time as a werehog, he had gotten very well-acquainted with the thing, and something looked different about it this time...

Sonic stretched forward to get a better view - and froze in shock at what he saw. He grabbed the now-full pot, and skidded to a halt in the workshop a quarter of a second later. "New problem, guys." _I'm in love with Shadow_ , was a thought he could not quite stifle before dragging his mind back to the point. "There seem to be two moons now."

"A second moon?" Tails echoed in surprise, but almost immediately nodded his understanding. "That would explain the weird gravity readings we were picking up! It's gotta be Eggman... Wave, I think I get it!"

"A gravity generator," Wave finished as she finished tightening the last screw on her now-clean Extreme Gear. "Eggman must have created it..."

"... to pull Angel Island away!" Tails realised with a gasp. "He probably waited for it to be cloudy so we wouldn't notice until it was too late!"

Wave nodded slowly. "I think you're right, Shorty. You're not as slow as you normally are."

Sonic folded his arms. "I see you're back to normal," he muttered under his breath. Aloud, he said, "And if you guys hadn't been poking around at the right time, it would have worked. I couldn't find any ways through the shield, except for whatever that army is guarding."

Tails nodded brightly. "So, it's time to go smash it!" He did not wait for a reply, already running from the room to get the plane ready. "Sonic, get more coffee!" he shouted over his shoulder.

Sonic raced to obey, waiting for the plane with two fresh pots. He looked at Wave, and frowned at her clear exhaustion. "You know, you look about ready to fall off that Extreme Gear. Why don't you ride in the plane and take a break, I'll run."

She hesitated, clearly fighting against common sense. "Normally I'd disagree with you on principle, but..."

Sonic gave her a quick shove in the right direction. "Would you just get in the plane already, Wave?!"


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

The sun had almost risen by the time they arrived at their destination, with Sonic now in the plane and Wave riding her Extreme Gear. As she had described, the huge energy shield was, in part, covering the ruins of an ancient city, barely more than dusty rubble now. A few of the crumbled walls were outside the shield, with a veritable army of robots camped out among them. It was hard to see through the shield properly, but there was a large floating _something_ inside that could only be Angel Island.

"See you down there!" Sonic jumped out of the plane, curling into a spinning buzzsaw and slicing through one of the larger robots to soften his landing.

Wave flew next to the plane, close enough to shout to Tails. "Hey, shrimp!"

He shot her a small glare. "I have a name!"

"Whatever." She shrugged him off dismissively, and pointed down into the impending chaos. "I think I can see a control panel down there. Keep those things off me, I'll see what I can do."

Tails did not bother arguing as she flew down, knowing there would be little point. "I bet I could hack that thing faster than her," he muttered aloud, knowing nobody could hear him as he flew circles around the battlefield.

Providing Wave with covering fire quickly proved to be something of a challenge when Tails remembered that his little plane had absolutely no weapons of any sort. He flew lower, looking for inspiration - and finding some as he saw Sonic dodging homing missiles. "Sonic!" he shouted. "Get them to shoot the missiles at me!"

"At you?!" Sonic echoed in disbelief.

"Yes, at me!" Tails tried his best to exude a confident _I've-got-this_ attitude rather than an _I'm-panicking-and-trying-not-to-show-it_ one.

Apparently it worked, because Sonic nodded cheerfully. "You got it, buddy. Homing missiles, coming up!"

Tails really, _really_ hoped he knew what he was doing, as moments later he found himself flying with no fewer than six of the things chasing him. Some experimentation and a quick corkscrew sent the first missile flying off harmlessly into a wall. "I'm coming, Wave!" he shouted down before she could yell at him to hurry up. A second corkscrew, this time more carefully aimed, and the second missile soared past him and into a group of robots that had been approaching the swallow. He cheered in a mixture of pride and joy as he saw Sonic giving him a quick thumbs-up.

* * *

Sonic's heart had nearly stopped at Tails's request. Sending homing missiles at his best friend/sort-of adopted brother was one of the hardest things he had done, but he knew that Tails knew what he was doing. It was both hard - so hard to make himself do it - and easy at the same time, a simple case of moving slowly enough for the missiles to get a lock, then diving out of the way and letting them follow Tails's plane instead. He was definitely paying a _lot_ more attention to his friend than to the robots in front of him, though. The only problem with that idea, though, was that while Tails was focussed on his fight, and thus doing absolutely fine, Sonic was very distracted. He saw Tails throwing one of the missiles as a test, then another at a group of robots, the little fox protecting Wave. He gave a proud thumbs-up as Tails looked down at him.

The bullet tore through his side, barely a glancing blow but enough to _hurt_. He fell with a scream as pain exploded inside him, only faintly hearing Tails yelling his name in panic and Wave shouting something best left unrepeated. His thoughts raced faster than his legs ever could. First fact: he was helpless now, lying on the battlefield while the robots recharged their weapons. Second fact: he would not survive a point-blank attack while he was lying helpless. Third fact: he had pushed through _far_ worse injuries. He forced his eyes open just in time to see the same robot raising its spiked claw for the killing blow.

" _Don't you dare hurt Sonic_!" The sound of Tails screaming in rage was at once both adorable and terrifying. Half a moment later, the world exploded around Sonic - as Tails flung not one, but three homing missiles at the robots around him. All Sonic could do was follow a hedgehog's most primal instinct, and curl into a spiky ball as shrapnel flew around him.

"Shrimp, I need you _now_!" Wave's shout came as the fireball started to fade around him.

"I'm coming, Wave!" Sonic heard the whirring of the plane's engines, then another explosion, before Tails called out again. "Sonic, you have to get up!"

The agony had started to fade now to a dull throbbing, and his little friend's words spurred Sonic into action. He forced himself to stand, taking a deep breath and starting to run again. Somehow, he had still been counting the explosions from the homing missiles, and knew Tails had now run out. "Thanks, Tails!" he called up, keeping his focus on the battle this time.

"Hey!" Wave was shouting again. "What are you doing up there?!"

Time to focus. Sonic started to run, his top speed reduced by shock and blood loss but still plenty fast enough for these robots. "Coming up, Tails!" he shouted to give his friend warning, before homing-attacking past a fresh batch of homing missiles, twisting out of the way mid-air fast enough for them to lose their target and fly after the plane.

This time, Sonic's focus was absolute as he twisted in mid-air, the bullets missing him completely now as he curled up again and launched himself forward in a series of deadly homing attacks. The roar of the explosions was little more than a distant blur as Sonic ran forwards, the pain from his injury only helping to sharpen his focus now.

* * *

Another quick corkscrew, and another group of robots vanished in flames. Tails had to fight not to get distracted himself, not to watch Sonic and worry, instead of focussing on dodging various attacks shot up at him. He skimmed the plane closer to the energy shield, letting most of the attacks fall harmlessly onto it instead.

"I've got it!" Wave shouted triumphantly. "Tails, get away from the shield!"

Tails was too used to following shouted orders mid-battle to argue, knowing how serious she was by the lack of insulting height-based nickname. He turned the plane around, heading away from the shield as fast as the engines would allow, pausing only to lose the final homing missile following him. The huge shield sparked, fizzled, and after a moment overloaded with a loud sizzle. Lightning shot out from it, completely frying the nearby robots - and one unfortunate hedgehog tail, judging from Sonic's startled yelp as he tried to flee the shield's attack radius. The Tornado's engines sputtered as the plane took a glancing blow, and Tails hurried to land before it failed entirely.

Moments later, he was running from a group of robots; the Tornado's fried engine would have to be repaired before he could take off, but that would be a fast enough matter to deal with once the robots were gone. Tails ran over the scorch mark on the ground where the shield used to be, looking in vain for a safe place to go among the ruins beyond. He knew he could easily take out one robot at a time, but there were far more than that following him - and to the sides - and, he realised with dawning horror, in front of him. He spun in a quick circle, but there was nowhere to run. He was surrounded.

Tails looked up, but no, there was one above him too, and his flight was nowhere near accurate or fast enough to avoid its attacks too. He shut his eyes tight in terror, screaming Sonic's name in desperate hope - and was still screaming three seconds later when he was snatched up by a very fast-moving pair of arms. He opened his eyes in relief, and gasped in surprise as he found himself staring not at Sonic, but at Wave. His mind, still sluggish from the terror of a few moments ago, was slow to realise that the swallow had rescued him. "T-thanks," he managed to stammer.

"Try not to make a habit of it?" she said, although there was no real bite in her voice as she dropped him onto the Extreme Gear in front of her, holding onto his shoulder so he could not overbalance.

Tails decided not to argue against the handhold; while he could ride an Extreme Gear about as well as her, balancing was different when he was not the one steering it. He looked around, taking stock of the situation below them. Sonic was far away - quite likely out of earshot - and fighting a trio of large attack robots. Tails looked around again, this time inside where the shield had covered, and slapped a palm onto his face as he saw a very familiar echidna and albatross fighting bitterly below. From the looks of it, Eggman had managed to lock Knuckles, Storm and Jet in some kind of energy cage, and then the predictable had happened. It was clear even from this distance that Jet standing nearby screaming at them was not doing anything to calm the fighters down. "Wave, look!" Tails said, pointing.

"Again?!" Wave sounded as though she was close to pulling out her feathers from frustration. "Hang on, Shorty. Let's go break that up."

Tails nodded, ignoring the insult and bracing himself as the Extreme Gear dropped down towards their friends. He jumped off a few moments later, namesakes whirring enough to give him a gentle landing beside a clearly furious echidna. "Knuckles!" he said, trying his best to get his friend's attention.

Knuckles did not take his eyes off Storm, who was currently receiving a stern lecture from Wave. "Tails, you know who that is!"

He shook his head. "Knuckles, we've got more important things to do than fight the Babylon Rogues. We need to stop Eggman!" He waited, watching the cogs slowly turning in his friend's eyes. "Sonic's going to get that cage open-"

"Behind you!" Knuckles interrupted, pointing behind Tails in alarm.

Tails squeaked in fear and ducked on instinct, rolling aside as a robot's attack hit where he had been standing.

"Tails!" Knuckles shouted, pounding on the cage's glowing bars in clear frustration. "Get me out of here, let me help!"

One brief glance at the cage was all Tails needed to tell him that that would be impossible. "I can't, it's not controlled from here. I can't open it without the controls!"

A blue blur slammed into first one robot, then another, then a third, and within the span of about a second the nearest trio had been reduced to sparking junk. Sonic stopped by the cage, giving Knuckles a grin. "Hang in there, Knucks. I'll get you out in no time!" With that, he was gone again, attacking the rest of the robot army.

"Tails." Knuckles drew a hand along his own side, tracing a line where the bloody wound lay on Sonic. "Is he...?"

Tails nodded. "I think he'll be fine, it's just a glancing blow." He was fairly sure his worry had not been hidden at all well.

* * *

The wound in question was barely figuring as a concern now, as Sonic ran, leaped and dodged his way through the rapidly dwindling army of robots. At his speed, it was a simple matter of a few quick spin-dashes, and before long he was standing in the middle of a vast field of scrap metal, all that was left of Eggman's vast army. Sonic grinned triumphantly. "And that's the last of them!"

"You think you've won?!" Eggman was in full-on Gleeful Boast Mode.

Sonic, of course, reacted as casually as possible, flicking a non-existent piece of dirt off of one arm, even as every instinct was ready for the inevitable attack. It was simply too much _fun_ to wind the evil scientist up. "Pretty much, yeah."

The wind was somewhat taken out of Eggman's sails. "Well... you haven't!" He drew himself up again, let out a quick evil laugh, and was back on track. "Because I have your precious Knuckles hostage! And that means you have to do exactly what I tell you, or I'll-"

Bored of the endless bragging already, Sonic sprang into action, homing-attacking onto the Egg Mobile and using his sharp spines to wreck its controls. " _Or_ I could do this," he said with a grin as the energy cage fizzled and died. "See ya, Egghead!" He jumped free as Knuckles punched with his full fury, and the Egg Mobile went soaring out of sight.

The echidna rounded on him, hands balled into spiky fists. "What took you so long?!"

Sonic just grinned, knowing better than to take Knuckles too seriously. "You're welcome, Knucks. Now let's get out of here, okay?"

Their attention was distracted by Jet, who was pacing furiously in front of Wave. "You went to Sonic!"

Wave shook her head, looking somewhat too tired to argue with him. "Well, what was I supposed to do?"

"Literally anything else!"

"Get over yourself, Jet!" She shook her head in frustration, exhaustion and irritation only adding to her already short temper. "Do you think I enjoyed going begging for help? I'm good, but I couldn't get past Eggman's defences all by myself."

Jet looked between Wave and the army of scrap, unwilling to accept her point. "Just don't do it again, okay?" He looked at Sonic, and his expression immediately turned into a sour glare. "You're lucky we have somewhere better to be right now."

Sonic rolled his eyes, although privately he suspected at least part of Jet's easy acceptance was Wave's visible exhaustion. No matter the hawk's flaws, he was at least loyal to his team.

Jet hesitated slightly, then shrugged with a deliberately-annoying smirk. "Not like you could catch up to me anyway." With that, he was already soaring into the sky on his Extreme Gear, Wave and Storm following quickly behind him.

"Damn it!" Sonic was glaring after the departing birds. "I wish I had my Extreme Gear, I'd show him who can't catch up..."

Tails beamed proudly. "Under my seat in the Tornado. I had a feeling you might want it." A moment later he was ducking in a failed attempt at avoiding a high-speed rub on the head, then another moment after that he was coughing in the dust cloud left by Sonic's departure.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

Sonic woke up before the sun rose. For half a second, he considered going back to sleep, then he remembered. Today was the postponed race against Shadow! His eyes sprang open, and he practically launched himself out of bed. A small fraction of a second later he was in the kitchen, grabbing something at random out of the fridge and pushing it into his mouth as fast as he could, completely ignoring the little voice of logic that reminded him it would be hours before the race would actually begin.

He tried not to get too excited, firmly reminding himself not to risk what little time he had to spend with Shadow. Still, though, just getting to see him again was enough for now. Sonic found himself pacing in little circles, and had to force himself to stop before he wore a hole in the carpet again. Today he would get to see Shadow again!

Sonic took a deep breath, trying to get himself to relax, but the effort did not last long. He had to run, he was going crazy from standing still! He ran, careful not to push himself too hard; he wanted to distract himself, not exhaust himself. After all, he wanted to win the race, not let Shadow win without even the power of Chaos cheating.

It was, perhaps, a good thing that they were due to meet early, as Sonic found himself completely unable to concentrate on anything. Whatever he tried to do, Shadow invaded his thoughts, distracting him and completely destroying his focus. He tried to make chili dogs, only to find himself still playing with the recipe long past the point of sanity, trying to make the chili the same colour as Shadow's red quills. Sonic wolfed down the chili dogs when he realised, pulling a face at how badly overcooked they had ended up.

Finally, eventually it was time to race. Sonic left the kitchen in a mess, knowing Tails would eventually drag him back to clean up the burnt mess that had ended up stuck to the pan, and soon found himself pacing impatiently, waiting for Shadow to appear. It seemed like an age, but Shadow appeared in a flash of Chaos Control.

"Shadow!" Sonic took a moment to try to calm down, not to babble out his feelings and ruin everything. "Ready to get your butt kicked in this race?"

Shadow frowned, indicating the wound from two days ago, which had healed considerably and was now visible as an angry red line on Sonic's side. "You're injured."

Sonic waved him off with a casual shrug. "A bullet scraped me. I'll be fine, it won't slow me down." He poked at the healing injury, relieved when it barely hurt. "If I'm lucky, it won't even scar..."

"If you want that, you should stop poking it."

Sonic grinned cockily to hide how touched he is by anything he could possibly interpret as concern from Shadow. "Yeah, yeah. Are we gonna race or what?"

Shadow's attention suddenly focussed on something behind Sonic. "Eggman's here."

"What?" Sonic turned to see the Egg Mobile rapidly approaching. He glared at the evil scientist, irritated beyond belief. Eggman was about to take the race away from him - his time with Shadow! "Oh come on Egghead, I just defeated you. Go away, we're busy!" He shot an apologetic glance at Shadow; the other hedgehog's expression was sour. "Sorry about this, Shadow. Let me just get rid of him, I'll be right with you."

Eggman waved him aside, his attitude as casual as if Sonic were just an irritating pest and not a real threat of any sort. "Oh, get out of the way, hedgehog. I'm here for Shadow."

Sonic found himself taken off guard at that. "What?"

"The Ultimate Lifeform," Eggman said, speaking now to Shadow and ignoring Sonic entirely. "You basically live on Chaos Energy, don't you? It flows through your body constantly..."

Shadow unfolded his arms, clearly wary and alert. "What's this about?"

Eggman grinned, an expression of pure sadistic evil. "Oh, I just got to wondering... if the Master Emerald can control the Chaos Emeralds, maybe its power could control the flow of Chaos Energy in you...?"

Shadow frowned and shook his head slightly. "That's not possible..."

"Isn't it?" Eggman pushed a button on the Egg Mobile's console, laughing triumphantly. "Well, let's try it, shall we?"

Sonic could see Shadow freeze in place, shaking slightly as he fought a losing battle for control. Whatever Eggman had done... the power of the Master Emerald, apparently siphoned off while he was busy fighting the robot army... Shadow clearly could not resist its power. For a moment, this seemed all too familiar, and Sonic remembered watching him trying to resist against Black Doom. He had won that day, but today... "This is just like Black Doom's paralysis gas!" he said, desperately hoping that that was true. "Come on, break out of it!"

"I was created with Black Doom's blood," Shadow said quietly, still frozen completely solid. This is the Master Emerald... I don't think I can break free of its power."

"Why are you doing this, Eggman?!" Sonic shouted, hoping perhaps he could get the evil scientist to brag enough to spill the beans.

"Oh, why?" Eggman was practically radiating smugness. "I'm just going to use my new puppet to get rid of you. Then nobody can stop me!"

Sonic interrupted the stream of maniacal laughter. "Then you're going to conquer the world without me to stop you, huh?"

"Exactly, Sonic!" Eggman laughed again. "Nobody will be in the way of my total world domination! And then _nobody_ can stop me opening the perfect theme park!"

He blinked. "Seriously, Eggy? That's your master plan, the theme park again? You know plenty of people open theme parks without all the mass murder and destruction, right?"

"Ah, but once I've taken over the world there won't be any pesky _regulations_ in my way," Eggman pointed out, apparently unbothered by such unimportant things as reason and logic. "Shadow! Hunt him down, destroy him!"

Sonic backed away as Shadow turned towards him, clearly under Eggman's control. "Not quite the race we planned, huh Shadow?" He grinned, and took off running, unable to help but enjoy himself despite knowing the stakes as Shadow skated behind him. Shadow was silent, and for once Sonic saved his breath and focussed on just running.

They raced like that for almost a minute, Shadow not quite able to catch up to Sonic's head start, when suddenly the darker hedgehog stumbled to a halt. "Sonic, stop!"

He skidded to a halt, surprised and more than a little confused. "New orders?"

"No." Shadow walked towards him, slowly and deliberately. "Apparently Eggman's control has a limited range."

"Oh..." Sonic grinned, and looked around until he spotted some nearby rubble. "That's a relief. Come on, let's hide under here, figure out our next move."

"I don't want to destroy you." Shadow's voice was clearly strained with the effort of holding himself still in their hiding place.

"Didn't figure you did." Sonic stood a little further away than he would normally, just in case Shadow's control failed. He grinned despite the situation. "I won't let that happen, don't worry."

One of Shadow's arms twitched out, almost making to grab Sonic, but he forced it back with clear difficulty. "I can't stop this," he said, almost managing to keep his voice steady.

Sonic took half a step further away from him, but made himself stay calm. "Try not to think about that for now, yeah? We've probably got a while before Eggman finds us."

"Hmm." Shadow was silent for a moment. "We've been racing a lot recently."

Sonic grinned in reply. "Hey, of course we have. It's good practice to race against someone who can _almost_ keep up with me."

Shadow shook his head slightly, but when he spoke his voice was noticeably quieter than normal. "I've enjoyed it."

He frowned at the unexpected admission. "Shadow, is Eggman making you say this stuff?"

"No!" Shadow replied sharply. "Eggman is controlling my body, but my voice is my own."

Sonic nodded, something in Shadow's tone letting him believe that was the truth. "Good. Because you _know_ I like racing."

Shadow hesitated, before speaking more quietly. "I meant I enjoy racing against you. Specifically."

"Wow." He had to take a moment to process what he had just heard, and smiled. "I really, really never thought I'd hear you say that, but... I hoped you did. I enjoy it too, there's a reason I keep challenging you."

The silence stretched on even longer, but Sonic made himself stay quiet. Either Shadow was struggling against Eggman's control, or he was trying to find the words to say something else; in either case, he knew it would be better to wait.

"Not just for the racing," Shadow said eventually, not quite able to meet Sonic's eyes.

A dozen smart retorts raced through Sonic's mind, but he swallowed all of them. "What do you mean?" he asked instead, his heart starting to race in probably-futile hope.

"You know what I meant." Shadow fell silent, but Sonic correctly guessed he was stalling, and waited for him to speak again. When he did speak, it was with clear awkwardness. "I wanted to spend time with you."

Sonic smiled again, trying not to get too hopeful, but knowing that at least he had a good chance of spending a lot more time with Shadow in the future. "Yeah," he said happily. "It's been fun, hasn't it?"

"It has." Shadow's expression was as stony as ever, and the only emotion his voice betrayed was the effort of resisting Eggman's control. "I almost want to..." His voice trailed off, the slightest trace of conflict visible on his face for a few seconds, before he changed the subject. "We'll race again, after this is over?"

"'Course we will," Sonic replied with a grin, and forced himself to risk everything on a desperate chance. "... and you want to be more than friends? That's what you were gonna say, right?" He looked into Shadow's eyes, and forced himself to keep talking while he was frozen. "Because I feel the same way, you know?"

Shadow blinked in surprise. "You do?" he asked eventually, his voice not quite steady.

"Yeah, I do." He smiled, hardly able to believe this was really happening. "Shadow... let's stop Eggman, then let's see where this goes, okay?"

There was another hesitation, then Shadow nodded. "Stop Eggman how exactly?" he asked quietly. "He has control of me, I can't do anything."

"Don't worry," he said with confidence that was not entirely genuine. "I always figure out a way to stop him." He was about to keep talking, but realised Shadow had completely frozen and backed further away slowly. "Uh, Shadow? You okay there?"

The answer came in the form of an all-too-familiar maniacal laugh, and a giant claw tearing the wall out of their makeshift shelter. Light spilled in, revealing Eggman triumphantly activating something on the Egg Mobile.

"Sonic, _run_." Shadow's voice was shaking, a clear sign of just how hard he was struggling to resist Eggman's control.

"Nah, I've got a better plan." Sonic's heart was pounding, knowing he had to get this right. He tried to appear casual, oblivious to Shadow's trembling hand reaching into his quills. "Sorry, Egghead. If you want to destroy me..." He paused - and let himself grin widely as he saw Shadow's hand, now holding his gun. "You're gonna have to try harder than that!"

With those words, he snatched the gun, and ran as fast as he could. Technically, he should be safe after a few miles; after all, they had already proved that Eggman's control lost its grip the further they got from him so there was no way Shadow could catch up to him, but he could not make himself stop running. His emotions were a blur, a jumbled mess of happiness and fear - joy at knowing Shadow felt the same way, and terror at what Eggman might make him do.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** Reviews are my lifeblood. I love reviews. Please review.


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